Trickster Area ... (is No Longer Available)

Not really bugs but minor issues :
- when uploading a new photo (in Manage Pictures) the field showing picture path and browse button are too thin (using Firefox 4). Probably a CSS issue.
- when adding information on food, toys and praise, the field only accepts 10 characteres. Could not write "saussage and cheese" for example.

3- You can now earn training certificate by participating in each of the training challenges marked with a certification icon. There are four levels to achieve: beginner, intermediate, advanced and expert. Once you complete any of the level, you will be e-mailed a printable certificate! (And they look very good might I add!)

It looks great!! Are the "levels" of each dog going to be stated on their profile somewhere?

That is the only inconvenience. The system is not designed to be easily transfer between a challenge video and just a normal video, so for now I would have to manually delete your video and you would have to re-upload it in the challenge. Is this something you could do? I can ask Chris to create a code to transfer the videos, but I don't know how often that will be used in the future...

Drat I was hoping it would be an easy add. I'm assuming that it wouldn't be needed at all in the future though so not a big deal.

I do have them the videos on my computer but since there's no option for user delete in my profile it's not that big of a deal. I don't really care either way about my videos; I just thought I would add them to the challenge area for more examples if it was an easy fix.

where can I post "normal" trick videos as opposed to the "challenge" videos? When I do a search for a trick, and locate it, is there a way to respond and upload my own video to that trick? The only thing I can find takes me to a link of the old forum where is says I am banned (??)

Ok now I have a question for you on the purposes of the challenge videos vs uploading trick videos. Is your goal eventually to have tons and tons of tricks organized by level in the challenge area? Or just slowly expand as people teach NEW tricks to their dogs and publicly state so in the challenge? In other words, would you want a new member who already has the tricks of say limp, shy, and marching previously and wants to show off those tricks upload their videos in the regular area or make new challenges for those tricks and upload their video there?

I can see both ways as creating new challenges for tricks already taught can give other people ideas of what to teach that they might not see in the normal video section. But on the other hand the fun part of challenges would be that you are committing to your goal to train this trick and can get other people to join you.

where can I post "normal" trick videos as opposed to the "challenge" videos? When I do a search for a trick, and locate it, is there a way to respond and upload my own video to that trick? The only thing I can find takes me to a link of the old forum where is says I am banned (??)

Can you send me a PM with the page and link you are clicking to receive the 'banned' message? I will try to fix it.

The link you want is located on the Video Gallery page, on top left it says Submit a Trick Video.

Ok now I have a question for you on the purposes of the challenge videos vs uploading trick videos. Is your goal eventually to have tons and tons of tricks organized by level in the challenge area? Or just slowly expand as people teach NEW tricks to their dogs and publicly state so in the challenge? In other words, would you want a new member who already has the tricks of say limp, shy, and marching previously and wants to show off those tricks upload their videos in the regular area or make new challenges for those tricks and upload their video there?

I can see both ways as creating new challenges for tricks already taught can give other people ideas of what to teach that they might not see in the normal video section. But on the other hand the fun part of challenges would be that you are committing to your goal to train this trick and can get other people to join you.

Well there isn't any 'goal' in mind. Challenges are fun because you can do it online and with someone. And someone joining a few months later has access to all of the comments previously left by other members. The problem with challenges that are limited to training together, is that 1) there is no real way of knowing whether a member is actually doing it or their dog already knows the trick 2) the challenge would have to be time limited until the people who started it together finish it 3) members finding the challenge a few weeks later wouldn't be able to join 4) once the challenge is finished, if someone wants to start that challenge again they have to create a new one, in the process losing all the valuable comments left by previous members in the other challenge.

I think for now, the best thing to do is look a the newest challenges and join those. If someone created it it's because they are interested in training it. Anyhow, the system isn't set in stone but let's give it a few months see how it goes. If something needs to change I will change it.

From my point of view, I think it doesn't matter if a dog knows the trick and enters a challenge. It would be frustrating not to be able to post videos of what we know. It's a way for us to tick the ones we have already learnt and, as there is no competition, it doesn't matter. Personally, I have sent videos of tricks we already master just to see what we still need to learn or work on. In the mean time, I have worked on the coin trick (we did not know that one) and Fly and I are presently working on the elephant trick.
The more videos will be available the funnier. I have watched other dogs' work and enjoyed it so it doesn't matter to me if they have learnt the trick one week or one year ago. They certainly have worked at some point to get it right.

Bug report (suppose it is a bug) :
I have posted 7 challenge videos and 3 have been approved. However, if I click on a challenge where my video has not yet been approved, I appear in "Dogs who have participated in this challenge" though my video is not there. Also, my profile's stats say I have 7 tricks but the stats next to "My Dog" says 3 tricks. Profile stats say I have entered 4 challenges (I suppose this means I have commented on 4 challenges).

Jean, I totally agree with your new challenge format in that you can enter at any time long after the original challenge was posted. I guess I"m still left wondering if it would be beneficial to the community to create new challenges with example videos of different treats I have taught such as hug or penguin, etc. so other members can get ideas of fun tricks to train. Or if you would prefer we don't flood the challenge section with hunderds of different tricks and instead wait to create "challenges" as we work on NEW tricks so we can in theory get another person to train with us, with the added benefit of that challenge still being open after we are done. Like I posted my current training of getting a back foot limp but have not posted videos of former tricks taught of which there are no current challenges for (leaving out the already posted videos in the trick section of tricks uploaded months ago).

Not really bugs but minor issues :
- when uploading a new photo (in Manage Pictures) the field showing picture path and browse button are too thin (using Firefox 4). Probably a CSS issue.
- when adding information on food, toys and praise, the field only accepts 10 characteres. Could not write "saussage and cheese" for example.

where can I post "normal" trick videos as opposed to the "challenge" videos? When I do a search for a trick, and locate it, is there a way to respond and upload my own video to that trick? The only thing I can find takes me to a link of the old forum where is says I am banned (??)

Bug report (suppose it is a bug) :
I have posted 7 challenge videos and 3 have been approved. However, if I click on a challenge where my video has not yet been approved, I appear in "Dogs who have participated in this challenge" though my video is not there. Also, my profile's stats say I have 7 tricks but the stats next to "My Dog" says 3 tricks. Profile stats say I have entered 4 challenges (I suppose this means I have commented on 4 challenges).

This should all be fixed and reporting the correct number of tricks. I am working on rebuilding the "Challenges Entered" count, which means the number of videos you've submitted to challenges. Thanks for reporting!

Found another bug :
I created a new challenge "chattering teeth" and uploaded an example video. When you look at the challenge, there is the example video aside on the right plus the same video underneath which says "'s video" (instead of Fly's video).
Same on the main frame for the full size video, it says " 's video". Fly does not appear as a dog who has participated in the challenge.

In my stats, the trick is not counted nor does the video appear. I understand there is a situation that needs developping here :
1) The new challenge is being created by a member who uploads a video showing any dog in action so his own dog does not yet master the trick
or
2) The new challenge is being created by a member who uploads a video showing his own dog in action so the trick should appear in his stats, the video should appear on his profile and the dog should appear in the trick as a dog who has participated in the challenge.

I'm amazed and grateful that I have found this website - up until now everyone else I know has thought I was quiet mad playing tricks/games with my dog ... it will be nice to share the madness with others!!! Thank you for a great website